Football Federation Australia (FFA) has decided to increase registration fees for youngsters and amateurs, as the governing body of the sport deals with financial issues following the Socceroos’ poor performance at the ongoing World Cup in Russia.
More to the point, for a child that was formerly paying $12.60, the fee will now be $14.00, while for an adult that used to pay $25.00, the cost will jump to $33.00.
It would seem there was a lot riding on that extra $5.5 million that the FFA would have received had the team progressed from the group stage to the final ‘16’ in order to cover for the heavy expenses required for the team to participate. Each player was awarded $300,000 and the FFA had to also pay for the friendly tournaments, the team’s training camp in Turkey, and a number of other expenses.
The FFA hopes that by introducing these higher fees, it will see a “modest $1 million profit for the FY2019”, as per its chief executive David Gallop.
However, not all concerning parties seem too thrilled by the idea of these increases.
The first to be affected by the changes are the parents of the children, who might see these fees as too high to afford, especially in the case they have two or more youngsters that are interested in the sport. There are fears this could result in children being withdrawn from football altogether, and Australia missing out on some great talent that would potentially better represent the country on the grander European football scene.
Local football organisations also don’t seem to be on board. Ian Holmes, chief executive of the Canterbury District Football Association, has called out the federation on its decision.
“One thing is self-evident, FFA have an under performing bloated bureaucracy which is not sustainable. Taxing junior and amateur participants will be a clear sign of failure on the part of the FFA, which in its present form, is an undemocratic entity controlled by a few people,” he said.
Mr Holmes’ club last season paid out $250,000 to the FFA from fees collected, and called into question how that money is being used.
“We are entitled to know where all the money is going. As it stands now, we get scant information from the financials,” he said.
The FFA defended its choice however, saying that the decision “wasn’t taken lightly”, and that there were already cuts made from last season up to $5 million, and that there will be even more made next season, which will save up to $1.6 million.
“As we have just seen in Russia, we want to be able to compete more effectively in the men’s and women’s World Cups by identifying talent in our grassroots clubs and nurturing that talent to be the best it can be. But football also faces some challenges,” said the FFA.
“Our game doesn’t yet generate the massive revenues from broadcast agreements that the other major codes enjoy. That’s why we’re expanding the A-League: to create a better competition that more people will want to watch. In the meantime, we continue to rely on funding from a range of sources to keep building the game.”